Cardinal Diamond Diaries: LIVE From Busch Stadium!

When you get an email from St. Louis Cardinals offering you free tickets, food, drink, and a chance to mingle and meet other writers and bloggers, you would have to be absolutely insane to pass it up, right?

We are here!

We thought so too.

Erika and I are currently hanging out in the Ozzie Smith suite at Busch Stadium with some of our favorite people, despite the fact that we just met many of them today or last night. I think there are still stars in our eyes from getting to meet so many people and do the things we have been able to do so far, and it is currently only the end of the second inning!

We were ushered in through a nice area with conference rooms and an area to meet and talk with various members of the Cardinals front office, including John Mozeliak. Mo chatted for a bit about various topics, then took a few questions from all of us, which we greatly appreciated. While I am sure that he skirted around some questions and did not give answers to the satisfaction of some members in attendance, I feel like we got a decent amount of information.

Chattin' it up with Mo

When asked about Pujols, we did get the company line of, "We tried really hard to get a deal done, but negotiations have been shut down as of right now, and we do not anticipate to bring them back up until the end of the season. At that point we feel confident that we can still get a deal in place, but we have to do what is in the best interests of the club." What did you expect?

When asked about the status of Wainwright's contract, in light of him being on the disabled list and not able to fulfill the stipulations of his contract extension, Mo said that the team had not as of yet had extensive discussions with the Waino camp, but that he has certainly earned the right to all that and more. Good answer! (Yes, I am wearing my Waino shirt. What did you expect?)

An interesting question to me was one about if he as a general manger ever looked back at guys that he had traded away, a form of "buyer's remorse" as it was. He said he did not, as it wouldn't really do him any good anyway (and then joked, "Isn't that what the media is for?").

When asked if he had any plans to get more involved with social media, namely all of us, Mo just kinda of went, "Well... no." At least he's honest! He said it is definitely a conversation he can have in the future, but he had not as of yet.

We were here!

I know there were other questions and answers, lots of information he passed out, but those are the clear ones for me. After Mo took off we learned about the new dynamic pricing program, which changes the prices of tickets based on the demand for each individual game. We also talked about about the 1120 program, which gets you a pair of vouches for $11.20 that will then get you into the game that night. The trick of it is that based on the game that day and the availability of tickets, your seats could be anywhere from field boxes to standing room only. It was at this point that I realized (again... still... some more) that I need to move to St. Louis so I can take advantage of programs like that!

A few other random pics, since it's now the fourth and I actually want to, you know, watch some of the game...